November 8: Greg Glesinger

Greg’s never been afraid of a little homework and during an unseasonably warm rut in Iowa, his preparation paid off.

Everyone loves the moment of truth when the bow is at full draw and pressure is building on the release trigger. We all want to see that arrow strike vitals, but it’s a smaller crowd willing to put in the work beforehand doing the research. With the aid of his Reconyx trail cams, Greg was able to make the most of his Iowa buck tag.

Once he pulled the cards, the pictures on them told the story of a mature deer Greg had dubbed, “Twin Towers” on his feet during daylight hours. This deer was killable, but only with the right setup. Armed with his PSE Decree , he and cameraman Kasey Morgan setup a Buck decoy and climbed into their blind then waited as the sun traversed through the autumn Iowa sky.

When Twin Towers showed up around 4pm, he was chasing a doe. The buck stayed out of range and stuck close to his mate as they melted back into the wood line and out of sight. Eventually they popped back out into the field, though this time, the doe was now curious about her artificial competitor. She wasn’t the only one interested in that Buck decoy.

A coyote entered the field at 4:50pm eyeing up the does and in the process, bumped the doe and with her, Twin Towers into bow range for Greg; a rare instance of a coyote actually helping a hunt. Greg capitalized on the opportunity as Kasey got the deer in frame. The Rage Extreme hit the buck and sent the deer charging off at 5:05pm.

Greg was concerned the hit was just a hair back and by watching how the deer behaved after the shot he know it was not a double lung hit. He’d seen the deer bed down within 60 yards and didn’t want to run the risk of bumping him. They stayed in the blind until 8:15pm that evening to insure a quiet exit, he and Kasey left all their gear in the blind and snuck out of the field.

When morning came, they found the buck 30 yards from where they saw him bed down. It was a solid hit and Greg punched his Iowa tag on a 162 6/8 inch buck.

In the deer woods, there are plenty of factors out of our control. Greg controlled the things he could and armed himself with critical field intel he could only get by doing his homework.